Botton v. State

420 P.2d 352, 69 Wash. 2d 751, 1966 Wash. LEXIS 1005
CourtWashington Supreme Court
DecidedNovember 17, 1966
Docket37916
StatusPublished
Cited by8 cases

This text of 420 P.2d 352 (Botton v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Washington Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Botton v. State, 420 P.2d 352, 69 Wash. 2d 751, 1966 Wash. LEXIS 1005 (Wash. 1966).

Opinions

[752]*752Hill, J.

The State of Washington, through its Department of Game, acquired by purchase a waterfront lot on Phantom Lake (nonnavigable) which it has developed to be used as a public fishing access area. Its use or abuse, for that purpose, has resulted in the present action by other owners of waterfront property on the lake, asking that the state be enjoined from maintaining its public access area. The trial court made very comprehensive findings of fact:

Since the defendant, through its Game Department, put in the public access area, the plaintiffs have suffered the following as a result of it:
1. The fair market value of plaintiffs’ property has been decreased.
2. Thievery on the lake has greatly increased, particularly the stealing of boats, oars, outdoor furniture, tools and miscellaneous items of personal property of all kinds. In many of the cases it was definitely ascertained that the thieves gained access to the lake from the public access area.
3. Persons relieving themselves in the lake as well as on the property and front yards of various of the plaintiffs, to the considerable embarrassment and annoyance of the plaintiffs, their families and guests.
4. Beer cans, worm cans, sandwich bags, pop bottles, rafts, and other assorted trash has been deposited in the lake and on the plaintiffs’ beaches in considerable quantity.
5. Repeated and frequent trespasses on the plaintiffs’ front yards, docks, beaches and property. In addition to the trespasses by persons coming in by the access area, numerous other trespassers have crossed the plaintiffs’ yards, docks, beaches and property from other adjoining residential areas, and which trespassers, when confronted by the plaintiffs, have justified their actions by saying to the effect that, “Well, now, it’s a public lake, isn’t it.”
6. Numerous of the plaintiffs, their children and grandchildren, have severely and frequently been cut by broken beer bottles left on the beaches.
7. Fishermen using plaintiffs’ docks, and fishing immediately adjacent to their beaches and front yards, would refuse to leave when requested and would stare and make remarks when plaintiffs, their wives and daughters would try to use their beaches for sun bathing, [753]*753swimming or the entertaining of guests. The plaintiffs, as a result of this, cut down very considerably in their use of their front yards and beaches.
8. Although hunting and shooting on the lake are illegal, hunters come in and hunt and shoot on the lake. Persons also come in and shoot at ducks with air rifles.
9. Speed boating on the lake has greatly increased. In some cases it has increased to the extent that it has become a danger to the plaintiffs’ children.
10. The public use of the lake has interfered with the plaintiffs’ use of the lake for boating, swimming, fishing and recreational purposes.
11. The noise on the lake has substantially increased.

From these findings, the trial court drew the legal conclusions that the state’s opening up of the lake to public use through its access area, without resorting to eminent domain, constituted a taking and damaging of private property without compensation to the owners thereof; and that the state’s opening up of the lake to public use constituted an unreasonable interference with the rights of the plaintiffs.

Based on these conclusions, the trial court entered an injunction enjoining the state

from maintaining its public access area on Phantom Lake as a public access area and from admitting the public to Phantom Lake and across the access area until such time as it condemns the plaintiffs’ property and property rights in the manner provided by law.

The state appeals, urging that as a riparian1 owner on a nonnavigable lake it can permit the public to enjoy the right to fish from boats over every portion of the lake so long as this does not constitute an unreasonable interference with the rights of the other riparian owners. This implies an obligation to police and control the use of the nonnavi-gable lake by the public to prevent such use becoming an [754]*754unreasonable interference with the rights of the other riparian owners thereon.

Any consideration of the rights of riparian owners and the owners of the beds of lakes must be in the light of the applicable statutes, particularly RCW 90.03.010, enacted in 1917, which declares that “Subject to existing rights all waters within the state belong to the public.”2

Our decisions relating to nonnavigable lakes fall into two classes, i.e., where we have been concerned with the right to appropriate water from nonnavigable lakes for use on the land of nonriparian owners or for public use, such as municipal water supply; and where we have been concerned with rights relative to the use of the surface of the water by the riparian owners.

The first class of cases3 have significance here only because they indicate the existence of and the importance placed on the riparian rights of bathing, boating, swimming, and fishing (at least in the nonarid portions of the state).

In the present case, we have no conflicting interest between the owners of the land abutting the lake and the owners of the lake bottom, as the upland owners also each own a definitely surveyed portion of the lake bottom and pay taxes levied thereon just as they do on their upland property.4

[755]*755The lake is small and shallow, covering 63.2 acres, and with depths running from extremely shallow to a maximum of 47 feet near the middle. The shore of the lake is partly surrounded with nice homes (most of the homeowners reside on the lake the year-round) and partly by as yet undeveloped properties. It lies between Lake Washington and Lake Sammamish (within only a few hundred feet of the latter), both of which are large, navigable lakes with many public access areas, parks, and beaches. There are no commercial establishments, resorts or public beaches on Phantom Lake. Nor were there any public streets, roads, or street ends which would give the public an access to the lake, until the state, acting through its Department of Game, acquired approximately a hundred feet of lake frontage, extending back some 800 feet to a public thoroughfare, and developed it to provide an access for fishermen and their boats.

There has been no serious attempt by the state to limit access to the lake to fishermen; and the trial court found that this access area had been open to any member of the public. We do not question the right of the state, as a riparian owner, to ignore the county’s zoning regulations and to permit the public, as its licensees, access to the [756]*756lake over its property. There is, however, a limitation, and that is that it cannot permit such use of its property as constitutes an unreasonable interference with the rights of the other riparian owners.

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Related

Pierce v. Riley
264 N.W.2d 110 (Michigan Court of Appeals, 1978)
Hefferline v. Langkow
552 P.2d 1079 (Court of Appeals of Washington, 1976)
Clippinger v. Birge
547 P.2d 871 (Court of Appeals of Washington, 1976)
Rose v. Riedinger
534 P.2d 146 (Court of Appeals of Washington, 1975)
Stempel v. Department of Water Resources
508 P.2d 166 (Washington Supreme Court, 1973)
Bach v. Sarich
445 P.2d 648 (Washington Supreme Court, 1968)
Botton v. State
420 P.2d 352 (Washington Supreme Court, 1966)
Ames Lake Community Club v. State
420 P.2d 363 (Washington Supreme Court, 1966)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
420 P.2d 352, 69 Wash. 2d 751, 1966 Wash. LEXIS 1005, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/botton-v-state-wash-1966.